A BOY’S EXPERIENCE
IN THE
CIVIL WAR 1860–1865
PRESENTED TO
WITH COMPLIMENTS OF Thomas Hughes.
Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1904 by THOMAS HUGHES,
the author, in the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
During the Civil War.
My father, a skillful physician by profession, was by taste and
inclination a controversal writer, a contributor to the newspapers,
mixing up in the stir of the times. Before the Civil War his energy was
devoted to a large and lucrative practice coupled with activities,
social and political. At the opening of the struggle between the North
and South his sympathies and associations ardently enlisted him in the
fortunes of his native State, and he furthered by writing and personal
work the adoption of the ordinance of secession which had been referred
by the State Convention at Richmond to the Citizens of Virginia to adopt
or reject. When the State seceded his ardent advocacy of the Southern
cause and his labor in that behalf quickly brought him to the point of
either taking the oath of allegiance as a loyal citizen of the United
States or submitting to imprisonment. He declined the oath and was sent
as a political prisoner in the spring of 1862 to Camp Chase near
Columbus, Ohio, where he remained for nine months, when a special
exchange was secured for him. This latter event he owed to a personal
circumstance, one of those matters he usually evidenced an aptitude to
turn to account. It occurred thus: one day a number of prisoners
recently captured were brought in, and he learned that shortly before,
the command to which they had belonged had taken a number of Union
prisoners, and among them a brother of Dr. Pancost of Philadelphia. My
father who had pursued his medical studies at Philadelphia and had been
a student under Dr. Pancost at the Jefferson Medical College wrote to
his former instructor, telling him of his brother’s capture and asking
him to secure a special exchange of my father for his brother. This he
accomplished and through friends my father was extended permission to
have his wife and three of his children accompany him by flag of truce
through the lines to Richmond. Ample time was allowed him to arrange his
affairs for this and he was further permitted to take unlimited baggage.
Our route was to Baltimore, to Fortress Monroe, to City Point,
Petersburg and Richmond. Baltimore was reached between three and four
o’clock in the morning and upon the recommendation of a fellow passenger
we sought quarters at the Eutaw House. This hotel, then as now at the
northwest corner of Eutaw and Baltimore Streets, was found crowded and
we located in the parlor until later in the day a room was assigned us
overlooking the court on Eutaw Street. A circumstance to impress was the
crowded condition of the pavement extending from Eutaw Street to Calvert
far in excess of what now exists after the lapse of over forty years,
thus indicating the inrush here as the border city of the Civil War. The
day our trunks were to be examined Major Constable, the provost marshall
of the city was a guest at a dinner party given by my father at Barnum’s
Hotel to which latter we had immediately removed, being told by our
Baltimore friends that the Eutaw House was a hotel patronized by
officers of the Northern army, whereas Barnum’s was a Southern Hotel. On
the day succeeding the search of our baggage we left our hotel where we
had remained about two weeks preparing for the trip South, and were
driven in a carriage to the wharf of the boat for Fortress Monroe. Some
informality attending the baggage required us to return until the
succeeding day. It appears that some official undertook to claim the
baggage had not been examined, notwithstanding the red connecting tape
with the seal of the provost marshall’s ring in red wax at each end and
it became necessary to have Major Constable straighten out the matter,
which fixed us to leave the next evening. One of those heavy storms that
occur on the Chesapeake Bay, with an alarm of fire on the boat were
incidents of the trip, and General George H. Thomas of the Union Army
who was a passenger and my father became acquainted with the result that
the former’s influence was utilized to secure more pleasant
accommodations on the flag of truce boat. The boats composing the flag
of truce were three in number with only one, that carrying our family,
carrying prisoners, all of whom were invalids, most of them suffering
from wounds, some of them of a most frightful character. It seems
unaccountable that those men in their condition should have been sent on
a trip to occupy two days and two nights without either surgeon or
nurses. My father was called upon to dress the wounds of several, one of
whom markedly attracted my attention by the fact that his entire back
seemed to have been shot away. Another, a young man about nineteen had
his right arm and hand paralyzed. There were perhaps a hundred
prisoners, all invalids. We started from Fortress Monroe in the morning
and about dark reached Harrison’s Landing where we anchored for the
night, it being inexpedient to travel except by day when our mission as
a flag of truce could be observed. The three boats being brought
together the evening was spent by the crew of the centre boat giving a
theatrical entertainment to which all were invited. The performance
simple, but amusing, consisted of a man who was supposed to be ignorant
but shrewd, being accosted by the questionable people of the city he was
visiting, in an effort to both rob him and have fun with him. As it was
purely original and played by people who were likely portraying personal
experiences, it was both intensely real and intensely amusing. The next
evening we reached City Point after dark and the following morning in
looking out my state room window I was delighted and elated at seeing
away up on the bank alongside a frame house a Confederate soldier with
gun doing picket duty. So constantly had I been thrown with Union
soldiers and had only seen Confederates as prisoners of war that to see
a Confederate soldier free and in arms doing duty on Confederate soil
was like a haven long sought for. The train of two passenger coaches
with an antiquated engine had brought down from Petersburg a large
number of people evidently attracted by curiosity and a number collected
on shore around the gang plank and exchanged newspapers with those on
board the boats. The large quantity of baggage we carried quickly
brought us trouble, for twelve trunks and a large chest for a family of
two adults and three children at a time when one traveling by a flag of
truce carried his baggage in his hand, excited suspicion and upon our
arrival at Petersburg we were directed to there discontinue our trip to
Richmond and my father was required to report daily to General Colston
until his status as a loyal Southern citizen could be established. The
Bollingbrook Hotel where we located was overflowing with Confederate
officers, and after three days spent there and after word being sent
from my father’s friends among them his cousin Jefferson T. Marten,
Confederate States Marshall for Virginia and Charles W. Russell of the
Confederate House of Representatives that if Dr. Hughes was not loyal no
one was, we were permitted to proceed to our destination. I was
impressed with the conviction that Gen. Colston’s action was merely from
abundant caution, for the friendly spirit shown my father and the
abundant good humor indicated that there was no real belief that all was
not right, but that the circumstances required examination and
explaining before we could be allowed to pass. A short ride soon brought
our train to the long high bridge over the James River and as it crossed
the bridge we got our first view of what was then wonderfully bustling
Richmond with streets so crowded that Main Street from Eighth to
Thirteenth on both sides was sometimes almost impassable, in marked
contrast some years subsequent to the close of the war when on one
business day during the busy hour of the day I once looked over the same
stretch and counted in the entire length but three people. A rattling,
uncomfortable omnibus carried us to the Ballard House, where we remained
some weeks. This hotel, perhaps the best in Richmond, was in curious
contrast to Barnum’s in Baltimore; at the latter every delicacy was
furnished in abundance—at the Ballard House the dessert for dinner for
instance consisted usually of rice pudding and apple pie, the balance of
the menu and the balance of the meals were on the same scale. At this
period there was only one other hotel in Richmond its equal, the
Spottswood at Main and Eighth burned about a year after the war, and two
more not so good, the American on Main Street opposite the post office
destroyed by the fire when Richmond was evacuated, and the Powhatan on
Eleventh opposite the Capitol Square and known after the war as Ford’s
Capitol Hotel. The Exchange Hotel was then closed. At that time gold was
worth about one dollar for three of Confederate. In 1864 and 1865 it was
worth one for sixty or seventy Confederate and board at the Spottswood
was then about seventy dollars a day. Bread was worth a dollar a loaf, a
large ginger cake cost a dollar and a pie cost a dollar, curious
disproportions.
An incident illustrative of a political canvass among soldiers was one
of the occurrences that soon attracted my attention. An election for
Confederate congressman for the District of Virginia, which now
comprises a part of the State of West Virginia was under way; the
candidates were Charles W. Russell formerly of Wheeling and a Dr.
Kidwell of, I believe, Clarksburg. The district was entirely in the
Union lines and hence the only voters were Confederate soldiers and
refugees. Dr. Kidwell had headquarters at the Ballard House in a room
opening immediately on the ladies’ entrance on Franklin Street at the
corner of Thirteenth and it was an occasion to make one cheerful to see
the Doctor who was tall and slender smilingly dispense good cheer from
numerous decanters to the many refugees and a few soldiers who sought
him. Mr. Russell also boarded at the same hotel, but he evidently felt
pretty secure, as he made no effort to entertain and his room was on the
upper floor. This canvass was in marked contrast with another that went
on near the same time at the Powhatan. An election for the State
Legislature was near and the candidates from the legislative districts
in what is now West Virginia met the same conditions, namely, their
territory was exclusively in the Union lines and the voters were
refugees and soldiers. Several of the candidates boarded at the Powhatan
and the meetings in the Congressional candidates’ room that were more
formal by reasons of the callers being from divers sections, now in the
case of the Legislative candidates became more sociable and nightly
refugees and soldiers from the same local section assembled and
intensely enjoyed the gossip that went on in a dense cloud of smoke from
tobacco pipes.
My father was a candidate for some medical position in the gift of the
President and by appointment he was taken accompanied by me to call upon
Mr. Davis. The President’s office was on the second floor of the post
office building entering from Bank Street, the street in the rear of
Main Street, and on the right side of the hall. My father took with him
for presentation to the President a curiously carved cane that had been
constructed by one of the prisoners at Camp Chase. Constructing articles
of this sort being the way prisoners passed their time. This particular
cane was made of pine wood, had winding serpents carved along it and was
varnished a dark, brown bright color. In the entree room was only the
President’s secretary and no others. When we were ushered into the
President’s room we found him alone. He was standing in the center of
the room and remained standing during the short interview which lasted
about five minutes, he did little talking, most of it being done by my
father, he had a natural, pleasant manner and gave close attention to
what was said to him and was apparently ignorant of my presence. I was
only a little boy twelve years of age. He was a small, delicate, but
active man dressed entirely in black, and one day after the war I saw
him as I believe walking on Baltimore Street in Baltimore, looking
exactly as I had seen him that day in his office in Richmond, except
that he no longer had the air of concentration shown at our interview.
It was rather a mystery to me how my father, a homeopathic physician,
expected to obtain a prominent medical position in the Government when
allopathic physicians alone held sway and homeopathy was unknown, but as
he usually managed to get what he wanted and I never made comments I
said nothing, although my notion turned out to be correct.
Homeopathy was not very extensively known in Richmond, a few years
before a physician of that school who had been located there had left
and from him or some member of his family my father obtained a list of
his former patients. He formed the acquaintance of several and his
journalistic relations formed in past years as a contributor to the
newspapers led him to look to the Richmond papers for help, so that most
of the papers were of great service to him. The Examiner had an
elaborate editorial on the subject of Homeopathy. The Enquirer, the
Dispatch and the Whig also contained flattering notices and Mr. Ritchie
of the Enquirer, Mr. Coworden and Mr. Ellison of the Dispatch and Mr.
Alexander Mosely of the Whig became his patients, as did also Mr. Smith
of the Sentinel when that paper was subsequently established, so that
the associations he thus formed, together with his being elected to the
Legislature to represent Ohio county in the Virginia House of Delegates
enabled him to keep his family in comfort. The latter office gave him
many privileges. For instance my shoes were gotten at the Penitentiary
whose superintendent Mr. Knote was a constituent of my father, and most
nice fitting shoes they were. He had passes over all the railroads and
his trips were both pleasant and productive of luxuries for at a time
when coffee was made of cornmeal rolled in sorghum molasses, roasted and
ground, and the only cloth was homespun and tea was about non-existent
as also loaf sugar, indeed everything reduced to the simplest, the
rations of the soldiers for instance being nearly exclusively cornmeal
and bacon, a trip of my father to Wilmington, North Carolina, led him to
visit a blockade runner from Nassau, the steamer Hansa, and when the
captain ascertained who he was, and through him he could obtain an
introduction to the President and others in authority at Richmond, a
shipment was received at our house from this ship of a bag of coffee, a
box of tea, a barrel of loaf sugar and cloth for suits of clothes and
toys for the children. It should be added that my father’s skill as a
physician quickly became recognized and his practice had extended to the
families of those occupying the highest official positions under the
Government. Upon another occasion on one of his trips he had obtained
under some advantageous arrangement a large amount of flour. This he
determined to sell and one evening he sold it to a baker on Broad Street
and the very large amount of money paid in bulky bills, he, out of
apprehension for the garroters that infested Richmond at this time,
concealed under my coat around my person, knowing there was slight
danger of any attempt to rob a young boy with ostensibly nothing to take
from him. The comparative luxury which we were enabled to enjoy was
participated in by my father’s constituents, for the Confederate soldier
from our district when visiting Richmond on furlough was welcomed and
entertained so that this period of my life is one that I look back upon
more than any other as the most pleasant and enjoyable. To what a simple
basis living had been reduced it may be noted that instead of candles
long wax tapers wound around in pyramid shapes were used, sorghum
molasses, black eye peas and bacon and cabbage and potatoes and cornmeal
were the staples. Flour bread was rather a luxury. There were two
principal confectionery stores: Pisani on Broad Street near 10th and
Antoni on Main Street near 9th, but the scant array in each was in sad
contrast to the luxury now found in any first class confectionery, at
the former one could get a saucer of ice cream, at the last a glass of
jelly. The scarcity of food and narrowness of range was in great
contrast to the vast number of people on the streets. On Main Street
from the Spottswood Hotel at 8th down to 13th Street near where the
Examiner and the Whig newspapers were located was a dense stream of
people on each side, mostly officers in uniform, for the private was
sure to be stopped by the provost guard that paraded up and down the
sidewalk looking for soldiers who were away without leave.
Free newspapers were another perquisite of legislators, except they must
send for them and my mission was to attend in 12th Street at the
newspaper offices early each morning among the crowd assembled there
waiting the distribution of the papers of which four: the Dispatch,
Examiner, Whig and Sentinel were in the immediate vicinity and the fifth
the Enquirer around on the other side of Main Street. It was upon one of
these occasions that I witnessed a memorable funeral of a soldier,
Lieutenant Noah Walker, whose home was in Baltimore who had been
recently killed in an engagement, his head having been, it was stated
completely destroyed and the Maryland friends in Richmond had been
requested to assemble early one morning at a warehouse opposite the
Examiner office at his funeral service. There were not many who came,
probably twenty. It was pathetic to observe the concern and silent
regard that each one manifested as strangers in a strange city away from
their home and friends doing homage to the memory of one who possessed
an amiable, gentle nature that attached all who knew him. The occasion
particularly appealed to me when told who he was, as this gentleman when
we first arrived in Richmond and when our straightened circumstances
required us to live all in one room had been a guest at one of our
breakfasts, which consisted of rolls and breakfast bacon broiled by my
father on the open fire of the room and which we all deliciously
enjoyed. The Marylanders and especially Baltimoreans were particularly
attentive in observance of respect for their compatriots and the funeral
of Lieutenant Walker was very much like that which took place at St.
James Church of Gen’l. Dimmock, the same assemblage of serious visaged
men, who indicated in their appearance that they were strangers away
from home and familiar associations and with an earnest concern for the
occasion and for each other. These experiences that appeal to
Marylanders were in contrast to another when General Pegram was married
in St. Paul’s Church to Miss Hetty Carey of Baltimore. Gen’l. Pegram in
full Confederate uniform and with sword at his side was accompanied by
Miss Carey, entering the church together. She wore over her dress a
heavy sash of red, white and red hanging over the right shoulder and
falling down below the waist on the left side. There was no appearance
of strangeness there and no air of constraint and all was great joyous
expectancy and full of life. Miss Carey was one of the belles of
Richmond and consequently the church was crowded. I stood in the
vestibule next to the inner door and as the two passed the scene was in
marked contrast to the sad sequel very soon to occur when Gen’l. Pegram
lost his life in battle.
Another circumstance of my father’s life as a legislator was the
opportunity afforded me of seeing and knowing the prominent persons
connected with both the Confederate and State governments and I soon
formed the acquaintance of almost every one in the State House. I had
the free run of the entire Capitol and was very much aided in this by
being taken from the private school I was attending, Mr. Alfriend’s, who
afterwards was the author of the life of President Davis, and placed
under a private tutor Mr. Burrell, a very old gentleman employed as a
clerk in the Auditor’s Office in the Capitol. I do not know whether the
Capitol presents the same appearance now as then, when the Legislature
is in session, but then around the rotunda was stretched a circle of
peanut stands, eight or ten in number and the floor was strewn with
peanut shells, tobacco juice and dirt and no one seemed to object. On
the side facing towards Broad Street on the first floor over the
basement was the House of Delegates, in the room over this was the State
Senate; opposite the House of Delegates across the rotunda was the
Confederate House of Representatives and in the room above was the State
Library.
Free access to the Capitol gave me the opportunity to observe minutely
the funeral arrangements for General Thomas J. Jackson. Stonewall
Jackson’s remains were brought to Richmond to lie in state in the
Capitol preparatory to his funeral. And they arrived late one evening
and were first deposited in a little room on the left of the entrance to
the Capitol on the side next to the Governor’s house. The burial casket
was placed on a bier, uncovered, and the custodian of the Capitol
permitted a favored few including myself to view the remains. The coffin
had evergreen heavily intertwined around it. There were no flowers. His
face was exactly as appears in his photographs, except it was thinner,
the features were perfectly placid, not evidencing that he had suffered
pain, his whiskers and mustache were of unusual thickness, his forehead
high and his hair coal black. I brought a small portion of the evergreen
on the casket away with me. After lying in state when his funeral took
place the cortege was preceded by a brass band that played a funeral
dirge; the horse that General Jackson rode with General Jackson’s boots
hanging down one on each side of his saddle came next to the hearse and
was led by his body servant. The funeral was impressive as only such a
one could be.
The Capitol and grounds were the center for interesting occurrences. The
second inauguration of Mr. Davis as President of the Confederacy took
place in front of Washington’s monument situated near the entrance to
the grounds from Grace Street. The ceremony was on the side facing the
Capitol and a dense concourse of people extended from that point almost
to the Capitol building. I was on the outskirts of this crowd and could
only see the outline of the figures of the participants in the ceremony.
On another occasion Gen’l. Henry A. Wise, ex-governor of the State, who
was levantly called “fire eater” was to make a speech in the hall of the
House of Delegates. His popularity and general interest to hear him was
evidenced by an assemblage that became so dense that an unusual
expedient was adopted, namely, an adjournment was had to the same point
from which Mr. Davis was inaugurated and when the speaker with the crowd
assembled reached the monument a rain came up so that he was obliged to
return, a large number of persons having quit because of the rain,
thereby leaving the room comfortably filled. His slender spare frame,
almost haggard countenance and shrill voice, all of themselves rendered
him a spectacular speaker and his eloquence directed immediately to you
made him an interesting speaker.
A curious occurrence took place daily in Capitol Square in the morning
before breakfast. A company of decrepit old men, all I think without
exception were thus, assembled on the broad walk along the Capitol
facing Capitol Street to drill as soldiers. The only striking quality
about them was their evident inability for service from old age and yet
the cheerfulness and zeal with which they handled their muskets and went
through simple evolutions evidenced a spirit unconscious of non utility.
This company shortly before Richmond was evacuated was succeeded at the
same place and at the same time daily by an equally curious assemblage
and that was a company of negroes, intended to form the embryo negro
troops for the Confederate army. I have heard it often declared that no
negro troops were ever enlisted on the Southern side. For a considerable
time before the war ended the enlistment of negroes as troops was
earnestly deliberated and the efforts in this direction in the Virginia
Legislature led to the formation of this Company of State troops. My
father as a member of the Legislature warmly advocated the enlistment of
negroes, having made an elaborate argument in the House of Delegates for
that purpose.
This company of negroes comprised about fifty or sixty men, about 25 or
30 years of age, were almost entirely dark mulattoes, wore no uniforms,
indeed few soldiers in the Confederacy wore uniforms except the officers
and most of theirs were shabby and old. The striking peculiarity about
this negro company was one that had appeared to possess the company of
old men, namely that while evidencing interest in their drill it
appeared to be for only momentary purposes and it all seemed to be
viewed as without any subsequent purpose. And the peculiarity about the
negro company was that they appeared to regard themselves as isolated or
out of place, as if engaged in a work not exactly in accord with their
notions of self interest, no doubt attributable to the fact that their
inclination must have been against engaging on the Southern side. Their
reward for enlistment I believe was to be freedom from slavery. The life
of a free negro in a slave holding country was however not a very
attractive one. He was usually shunned by the slaves, who were jealous
of him and from whom he usually held aloof and the whites regarded him
with suspicion as unreliable and indifferent.
An incident occurred in my experience at the Capitol that may be
regarded as of particular interest. I have a portion of the Confederate
flag that floated over the Capitol, the Capitol of the Confederacy at
the fall of Richmond. When last in Richmond the Librarian in the State
Library upon my asking him what had become of the flag, showed me a
small bundle of bunting lying in a glass book case and he said it was
portions of the flag that people had brought back and given to the
Library. I told him I had a piece but intended to retain it. Mine came
into my hands in this wise. As my father was a member of the House of
Delegates this gave me the run of the Capitol and I was intimate with
the pages in the House. On one of our excursions through the building we
went through the Library and through a garrett above and then through a
trap door onto the roof, in returning I was last and lying on the roof,
half inside the open trap door was the flag, at the end it had a slit
about one inch long and wide and it was so suggestive that involuntarily
almost I continued the slit for the flag’s entire length and tearing the
strip away, rolled it up and put it in my pocket.
At another time I ran across the Vice President Alexander H. Stephens.
Something attracted his attention to me. He regarded me with curious
interest, I presume because a little boy was observing him so closely.
His lameness and delicately drawn features were sufficient to attract,
but his small stature and earnest, studious expression of countenance
were equally attractive. He like most of the persons I saw or met in a
prominent government relation in Richmond seemed to take the life of
these strenuous, stirring times most philosophically and in a matter of
fact way free from worry or excitement. When it is remembered that the
cannonading below Drury’s Bluffs on the James River below Richmond could
not only be distinctly heard but it was only necessary to secure an
elevation and see the distinct flash of the cannon it will be seen how
close we constantly lived to conditions of trouble. Often I climbed the
garrett of the Powhatan Hotel, where many of my legislative friends
boarded to see the flash of the cannonading.
Genl. Smith, ex-governor, “extra Billy Smith” he was called was another
interesting person I met at the Capitol. The reputation he had acquired
of kissing all the babies on his election tours was warranted by his
manner. Ease of bearing, perfect accord with you, absolute freedom from
any ostentation were patent, no effort to lead in conversation, the
friendly utterances of an old friend all bespoke in him the consummate
politician rather than the soldier.
One of the most historical events that occurred in Richmond I have never
seen referred to in any writing. It was after the return of the
unsuccessful peace mission to Fortress Monroe. A mass meeting was held
in the African Church in Broad Street near the Monumental Church and the
speakers were detailing to the audience the events and results of the
mission. One of the last speakers was Judah P. Benjamin, Secretary of
State of the Confederacy, and one of Mr. Benjamin’s declarations was
made with great vehemence that as long as a drop of blood flowed in his
veins and until the last drop, he would never surrender. It is peculiar
that Mr. Benjamin was entirely consistent in this declaration of his,
because as the Southern Confederacy faded away he escaped in an open
boat to one of the near by South Atlantic islands of England, Bermuda, I
think, and ultimately reached London where he achieved great eminence in
his profession as a lawyer and ultimately retired to Paris where he died
without ever returning to the United States.
General John H. Morgan I saw immediately upon his return as a prisoner
from the North. He was warmly greeted in Richmond and his gratified
expression showed his appreciation. His healthy complexion, well kept,
full appearance and free from care air indicated, that although a
prisoner he had evidently been supplied with necessaries that were
strangers to the meagerly supplied Confederate officers in active
service. Genl. Morgan was of rather more than medium size and
development and reminded one more of the bonhomie clubman, bordering on
the genial and agreeable Bohemian rather than impressing one as the bold
dashing border raider in which he had acquired his reputation, and as
which he soon after leaving Richmond lost his life.
General J. B. Stewart, “Jeb Stewart,” who commanded the Confederate
cavalry was of a remarkable personality. I saw him riding at the head of
his cavalry in passing through Richmond. His hair was black and long,
his face was full, with large eyes and a prominent nose, his shirt was
cut low particularly in front, showing a massive neck. He sat on his
horse the perfection of a horseman, holding the bridle in such a way
that the horse, a well kept one, seemed to partake of his rider’s
intense vitality. Although Genl. Stewart was unlike General Pickett, yet
something applicable alike to the two reminded me the one of the other
and when I saw General Pickett at the head of his command, as I did,
pass through Richmond before the battle of Gettysburg and then saw this
same command with its thinned out ranks on its return after the campaign
in which that battle took place, the contrast was so heart rending that
it was an exceedingly sad welcome extended them. Troops were constantly
passing through Richmond the last two years of the war and the
scantiness which existed in rations to which I have already alluded, the
staple fare being corn bread and bacon, extended to the clothes of the
soldiers. In a large command for instance a brigade it was customary to
see numbers of soldiers without coats, others without hats, others
without shoes, conditions almost incredible to believe unless actually
seen as I often did. Upon one occasion while it was snowing a brigade of
infantry was marching up Main Street and when it reached the Spottswood
Hotel a hatter named Dooley who kept a hat store under the Spottswood
rolled from his store a number of large wooden boxes, broke them open
and took therefrom a collection of shop worn straw hats which he
forthwith preceded to distribute to those of the soldiers who were
without any covering for their heads to shield them from the falling
snow. How our soldiers with all their discomforts, privations and sad
conditions were capable of doing any fighting instead of being the
brave, enduring men they were furnished a great tribute for the Southern
spirit, and the Southern cause.
General Ewell while he was recuperating from his serious wounds lived
immediately opposite our house on Marshall street in Richmond and would
daily on his crutches walk up and down the porch. He was tall and
slender and in his neat gray uniform and with his dark bushy whiskers
enveloping a pallid face his appearance was a reminder of the suffering
he had endured.
General Jubal Early was a small, active nervous man with a curious
mixture of force of character and apparent volatileness. His most
striking characteristic was unceasing restlessness. He said nothing and
did nothing that was particularly impressive, but in a large room
crowded with men with no particular deference shown to him I was
instantly attracted by the movements of one whom I soon learned was
General Early and I then understood how he had worked out the results he
had in his historical valley campaigns.
Colonel Mosby I never saw until shortly after the war ended, that was at
the funeral of Hon. Charles W. Russell in Baltimore. He was a man that
reminded me very much of General Early except that he was of a quiet
bearing, closely shaven, with keen eyes and an incisive manner and one
could believe how he had been successful in the many raids that had made
him famous. On one of these raids he had captured General Benjamin F.
Kelley and General Crook, two Major Generals in the Union Army, having
ridden one night with a detachment of his cavalry through the Union
lines to the Hotel in Romani where they were staying, required them to
rise, dress and accompany him past their own troops into the Confederate
lines, the Federal troops supposing Mosby’s men to be a detachment of
their own cavalry. The two captured generals were brought to Libby
prison in Richmond. Genl. Kelley had married into a family with whom my
own family was intimate and my father when he learned of General
Kelley’s arrival arranged to visit him. We took with us a large market
basket filled with eatables, such as Maryland biscuit, a boiled ham and
other nice things and after passing through the outer offices of the
prison we came into the large room where General Kelley was. I was
struck with the very small number of prisoners in so large room; Libby
Prison had been a tobacco warehouse and this one of the large rooms of
the warehouse, on the first floor from the entrance and second floor
from the rear. There was only one other Union officer besides General
Crook in the room and he was in the open space between that and the next
room. We talked with General Kelly near the window in the rear, there
were no chairs in the room and General Crook stood off in the middle of
the room viewing us with curiosity. He had on long boots that came above
his knees, his pants being inside and one foot was on the floor and the
other, his right, resting on a box, he was slightly stooping over with
his right hand on his knee. General Kelley called to him and he came
over where we were and after being introduced joined in our
conversation. The extreme pleasure shown by General Kelley and the
interest of General Crook at our visit was always a pleasant experience
in my life which made me follow in watching the fortunes of these two
Union officers until each passed to the other shore, the last being
General Crook, his death affecting me markedly from the deep impression
he had made on me in that interview and from the close observation I had
kept of him.
There was another prison in Richmond not so well known in the North as
Libby Prison, but was better known in Richmond and to many Southern
soldiers and that was “Castle Thunder.” That was where deserters were
kept and the gentleman in command of the prison was Captain Alexander
from Baltimore. I once dined with him and his wife at the house where
they boarded. I was a guest of Captain and Mrs. Alexander and they had
another guest about my age, Rosa, the little daughter of Mrs. Greenhough
of Washington, who after surviving a period of confinement in the
Capitol Prison at Washington almost within the shadow of the statue
sculptured by her husband had been permitted to come South to Richmond
accompanied by her daughter.
There was still another military prison in Richmond and that was “Belle
Isle,” out in the middle of James River. As Libby Prison was exclusively
for captured officers, so Belle Isle was exclusively for privates of the
Union Army, and just as I had been deeply impressed with the few
prisoners in Libby Prison, I was markedly impressed with the throngs of
prisoners at Belle Isle. I once accompanied my father and a number of
our soldiers to call upon one of the prisoners at Belle Isle. This
prisoner was sent for to come to the gate to talk with us, but when he
came he did not seem particularly glad or sorry to see us and seemed to
regard us with uninterested curiosity rather than anything else.
General Robert E. Lee I met just after the war closed. He had returned
to his home in Richmond on Franklin street between 7th and 8th, a house
that belonged to Mr. John Stewart, a wealthy Scotchman who resided at
his country place on the Brooke Turnpike and had his business office in
the basement of the Franklin street house. Mr. Stewart’s family and
General Lee’s wife were patients of my father. Mrs. Lee had long been an
invalid and upon the occasion of meeting General Lee I accompanied my
father who went to pay a professional visit to Mrs. Lee. I carried with
me six of General Lee’s photographs intending to ask him to sign his
name on each. We were ushered into the parlor and General Lee almost
immediately appeared. My father introduced me and then went upstairs to
see Mrs. Lee leaving me with General Lee who invited me over to a seat
on the sofa in the corner by a window alongside of him, he sitting next
to the window. Prior to sitting on the sofa however, I told him I had
brought my photographs to ask him to sign his name to them and he took
them to the dining room in the rear of the parlor where he said there
were pen and ink and soon returned with his name signed to each and all
of which I subsequently gave away, except two that I still have. On
taking his seat alongside of me I was struck with the naturalness and
simplicity of his actions and conversation. He had a full face, clear,
open eyes, healthful complexion, full beard of gray and carried himself
in a quiet naturally dignified way. In reply to his questions I told him
I had been before the war closed and up to the evacuation of Richmond a
cadet at the Virginia Military Institute, being the youngest cadet in
the corps, and no doubt had been the youngest that ever attended there,
being only fourteen years and six months old. He told me that he had
just had a visit from and talk with General Smith, the Superintendent of
the Institute who told him he purposed to make arrangements without
delay to reopen the Institute at Lexington its former home before it was
destroyed by General Hunter of the Union Army, and I urged General Lee
to intercede for me with my father to permit me to return to the
Institute. It was a great source of personal gratification to me, a
young boy to have had this talk with General Lee. There is one feature
with reference to General Lee that I deem it necessary to advert to. In
some way, I know not how, it has been recognized as true that General
Lee entertained great respect and high personal regard for General U. S.
Grant. I know that General Lee had occasion from time to time to write
from his headquarters around Richmond to my father in reference to Mrs.
Lee’s condition and in one of these letters he gave distinct expression
to the views he entertained in reference to General Grant. It is
possible that these views were modified at the time of his personal
intercourse with General Grant incident to the surrender of his army,
but one would find difficulty in discovering any thing in the incident
of the surrender other than those of a negative character calculated to
produce decided changes in an opinion preconceived of General Grant’s
character: and one’s opinions in matters of this sort are not usually
affected by negative influences. The views expressed by General Lee in
his letter were not those popularly accepted after the war as expressing
a high regard for General Grant, but were the views generally
entertained and expressed of General Grant by the Southern people in the
South during the war, except that General Lee was utterly incapable of
voicing the popular Southern expression wherein General Grant was styled
in the South during the war by the Southern press and by popular
expression there, horrible as it now sounds, a “butcher” in consequence
of the apparently heartless way in which he subjected great bodies of
his troops to what appeared useless loss of life.
In one of my interviews with Colonel Charles Marshall of Baltimore with
whom I enjoyed many years of intimate professional relation, I stated to
him what I have above referred to, mentioning the sentiments expressed
by General Lee in his letters to my father. Colonel Marshall who had
been General Lee’s private secretary during the war gave me to
understand that he knew they were the sentiments actually entertained.
Governor Letcher was the war governor of Virginia. Those who called upon
him were received in a room in the State House at one end of which stood
a large side board occupied by decanters and glasses, a part of his
Creed was to extend the hospitality of this side board to each visitor.
Virginia hospitality required him to keep company in the partaking of
the refreshments with the result that he had a phenomenally red face,
perpetually wreathed in smiles. It can be understood that delegations of
legislators often called upon him. He also frequently held evening
receptions that were exceedingly agreeable and very popular, although
never crowded and at one of these receptions which I attended I remember
viewing with astonishment, a portly man with long black curls hanging
down his back and with him an exceedingly pretty young girl whom I
learned was his daughter. This individual was well known in Richmond and
will be recognized without further description by any one conversant
with Richmond life during the war. At the time General Hunter burned the
Military Institute at Lexington he also burned Governor Letcher’s house
located there in revenge for which it will be remembered that Harry
Gilmor on his raid into Maryland burned the house of Governor Bradford
on Charles Street Avenue a few miles out from Baltimore. This same Harry
Gilmor possessed qualities of a superior character, for I remember that
after the war when he returned to Baltimore, with the occupation for
which nature fitted him as a soldier, gone, instead of his becoming a
stipendiary on the bounty of his friends, he engaged for a while as a
journeyman painter, although no one had been raised with better rights
to gentle associations and I once viewed him with intense interest
painting the front of a house on the west side of Eutaw street near
Franklin and he was doing his work earnestly and well. With a slight
natural defect in one of his eyes, his face was entirely oblivious to
the fact of anything unusual in his occupation, a spirit of independence
that soon after led to his being elected sheriff of the City. This same
position of sheriff was also held by another returned Southerner who had
gone to Richmond from Baltimore where he had been Marshal of Police
shortly after we had passed through on our way to Richmond. This genial
gentleman, George P. Kane, showed in every trait and manner his racial
extraction and it was no matter of wonder that he passed from sheriff to
Mayor of the City.
When the Virginia Military Institute was burned after the battle of New
Market where the cadets lost a number who were killed and where many
were wounded, the corps was sent to Richmond. Every Richmond boy had a
great ambition to go to the Institute, at that time regarded as the West
Point of the South. The cadets were a part of the Confederate army and
every graduate was given an officer’s commission in the army. Incidents
were constantly occurring to keep alive and active this spirit to become
a cadet—boys have little fear of bullets, they enjoy the excitement of
active army life and even death and wounds appeal to them as making
heroes. After the battle of New Market one of the cadets a son of Dr.
Cabell of Richmond who was killed in that battle was brought to Richmond
for burial and his funeral took place from his father’s home on Franklin
street where he lived, a neighbor of General Lee. I remember as the
remains after the service were borne down the front steps and through
the iron front gate the intense awe and respect in the face of the young
men assembled on the pavement around the entrance to the open space in
front of the house. It was here I believe I first formed the
determination to be a cadet and, strange to say, when I first entered
the cadet ranks, the drill master assigned to our squad was Bob Cabell,
a brother of the cadet whose funeral I had attended that day.